


Jewelry is so Pretty (But it Stains my Neck Green)

by WereAllDeadInDevilTown



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: Abuse, Angst, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Evie-Centric, F/F, Found Family, Graphic Description, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Kind of a character study, MIGHT become a multi fic, Mild Gore, Pre-Descendants (2015), Rated teen for violence, Sad Ending, Secret Crush, Stealing, Violence, corefour - Freeform, i wrote this literally a year ago, if you want a chapter 2 pls comment, i’m torn, jay is evie’s big brother, malvie but you have to squint a bit, wlw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-02
Updated: 2020-07-02
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:34:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25027813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WereAllDeadInDevilTown/pseuds/WereAllDeadInDevilTown
Summary: Evie doesn’t get out of the castle much, which makes it all the more special when on the rare occasion her mother lets her out she just so happens to run into thief extraordinaire Jay.Mal might not be her biggest fan, but Evie has a way of growing on people, and the three start to feel more like friends instead of accomplices. (Or maybe even something more?)Too bad on the Isle good things never last.
Relationships: Evie & Mal (Disney), Evie/Mal (Disney)
Comments: 11
Kudos: 29





	Jewelry is so Pretty (But it Stains my Neck Green)

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warning for child abuse, violence and mild gore (blood, bruising, broken nose ect.). Please read with caution!!

“What do you think she’s drawing?”  
Evie nearly jumped out of her skin at Jay’s hushed voice, gasping and grabbing for her chest instinctually. She shot the boy a nasty and alarmed glare as if he’d just spit at her or done something equally unbelievable and inhumane, which subsequently sent the boy into a fit of laughter. Even though Jay had leaned in close from where he sat criss-cross on the floor beside her with their backs to the wall and spoke rather softly, apparently his deep voice was enough in the otherwise silent room to take her by surprise when it permeated the quiet. Plus, she’d kind of been spacing out honestly, simply ruminating on the day’s events. It’d been an awfully good day, after all. Perhaps her first one in a while. 

Jay, who had now been lying on his side on the floor and clutching his stomach as he chuckled at Evie’s over-reaction for several moments, finally sat up and composed himself after she whacked him pitifully on the arm. Jay wiped tears of laughter from the corners of his almond-shaped eyes as he straightened up with a smirk, shaking his head and snarkily admiring her red face. Even though she tried to appear annoyed and embarrassed, her mouth was smiling hugely, as the older boy had noticed it so often did. He figured that was a lot of the reason why Mal had let Evie stick around for so long, in addition to her being surprisingly useful on the streets. It really wasn’t very often that, in all their many years of working side by side as inseparable partners in crime, the two vagabonds stumbled across a smile like that.  
“You are so dramatic.”  
Evie gasped, before immediately realizing that perhaps this response would support his argument, correcting the expression. Suavely she crossed her arms over her chest and pursed her lips, trying to look unfazed by Jay’s accusation.  
“Hardly.”

Jay opened his mouth to call bullshit but Mal huffed and shot the two of them an annoyed glare from across the hideout’s main room. She was seated over on the stained, abandoned couch they’d nabbed a few weeks back, but even so, her steely gaze made Jay close his mouth again. Her scabbed knees were almost pulled flesh to her chest, probably so that the paper she drew on was so close to her face no one else could have possibly snuck a peek at it, Evie thought. Mal knew well that neither Jay nor Evie would have dared to attempt such a thing. I mean even Evie, who was still in many ways ‘new’ to their little group, was aware that Mal wouldn’t hesitate to kill her if she checked out her art without the purple-haired girl’s heavily sought after permission. 

But even so, it was just Mal’s nature to protect what was hers anyway, to stay on guard out of habit, I guess. Evie had noticed in the past three and a half months she’d spent with the two villain kids that there was very rarely a time when Mal wasn’t like this, all wiry and ruffled like a feral cat. She intrigued Evie. She longed to know what the girl was like when she wasn’t holding the entire world an arm’s length away, what she was like at her most vulnerable of times. Briefly, she wondered if for Mal moments like this even existed, such a foreign concept to the blue princess who always felt vulnerable, even when tucked away in the safety of her own castle. Maybe especially when tucked away in her castle. Evie shook her head and expelled these curiosities, realizing that it didn’t really matter whether Mal was a being truly incapable of infirmity and passivity or whether she was just very skilled at the art of masking these unpleasant emotions, because either way, Evie would never see them. Perhaps Jay knew, and he would tell her, but she would never see for herself because she knew Mal would never show her. 

There were lots of things about the sudden change her life had taken since running into a tall, dark and handsome thief months ago that Evie didn’t quite understand, but Mal was perhaps at the top of that list. The only thing she knew for certain about the aloof and cold fae was that she certainly wasn’t very fond of her. The reason why exactly was unbeknownst to Evie, I mean she’d made a clear effort to be very friendly and courteous considering no villain kids before had approached her with the intention of teaming up. In fact, other than Uma’s pirate crew which was more of a joke in the eyes of most on the Isle than anything else, Evie knew of very few kids who worked together. No one shared, no one helped one another...it just wasn’t the Isle way. At least, she hadn’t thought it was. Then she met these two, who had worked for years and perfected their technique until the entire island was wrapped around their fingers. It was impressive, and Evie wasn’t very easily impressed. 

Never, before meeting Jay that is, had her typical pickpocketing maneuver failed. Evie didn’t particularly enjoy stealing, it made her nervous and guilty and was not something she found satisfying unlike someone like Jay, born with sticky fingers. On the Isle, however, stealing was necessary for survival. Evie never took coins or money or food, since she figured others probably had a better use for things like that than she, instead she only ever stole jewelry or handbags- things that her mother might reward her for. It was like a sick trade-off, Mommy would let Evie go outside and see the sun, but only if in return she came back with something that made her daughter’s absence worthwhile. After all, there was really nothing Evil Queen liked more than the control she had over her obedient little daughter. In a perfect world, Evie would probably never be let out.

But Evie was a master at playing the game. She had gotten very good at begging and pestering, at making her large brown eyes droop and her bottom lipstick out just right, and over the years Evie had proven to her mother that letting her outside could be a good thing. She hardly ever even had to beg to be let out now, not when she almost always returned with expensive designer items. Well, Isle designer, which in Auradon would have been worth a few cents but here was worth everything, and that was enough for her phony of a mother. Typically she would target salesmen running a booth at the market in the center of town, selling heels or dresses or purses, something appealing. Evie was good at weeding out the weak-willed ones, the ones who lingered on her legs a little too long when she sauntered past in a blue dress and black heels, curls bouncing naively. She would circle back to them and make small talk, leaning over the counter and pretending to be interested in something they were trying to sell her. She would wait to see if they ever bothered to make eye contact, and when they didn’t as they seldom did, too busy looking elsewhere, she would swipe something from the countertop. While they were distracted she would take the most expensive-looking thing within her reach, a golden brooch or a set of bangles, and then she would smile and thank them with a wink before walking away with the typical bounce in her step. She would feel the eyes on her as she walked away, ravenous gazes so prominent on the Isle, but the item clutched in her hand or hidden under the ruffles of her dress made it worthwhile. 

This tactic had never before failed her. Never before had she been caught, not even when she was first learning, and especially not now when it had become a nearly bi-weekly routine for years. Until she met Jay, of course. It was an accident that she’d run into him, really. She was running down a shadowy alleyway from a few of Uma’s meddlesome pirate boys, fed up with their incessant cat-calling from the wharf when she smacked straight into a chest. A large, rather hard chest, she might add. Jay was chuckling and offering out his hand to help her up by the time Evie had regained her bearings enough to quit clutching her lightly battered head and look up at the mysterious boy in front of her. She gasped when she saw it was Jafar’s son. Evie knew him because of course she knew him, most everyone on the Isle did. He was infamous, not only for hanging around Maleficent’s brutish daughter, but for being one hell of a fight and one of the best thieves on the entirety of the Isle. He was intimidating, especially as he loomed over her now, but hesitantly Evie took his hand and let him help her up, shocked my how surprisingly and uncharacteristically soft his hands were. She laughed nervously, quickly turning on the charm. He smiled at her as she played with a lock of curly blue hair, twisting it around her finger mindlessly and scooching closer to him as she pretended to ask for directions and explained that she didn’t really leave the house much. 

In hindsight, of course, it was a dumb idea to try and steal from the Isle's most well-known thief himself, and Evie should have known this. But when she caught the glint of the gold and red stud earrings in Jay’s ears off the streetlights, she simply couldn’t help herself. She was already here so close to something so elusive she figured, and she found him so alluring, and her mother had torn her apart so harshly before she’d left the house that morning, and so before she knew what she was doing she was going through the motions, luring him into her trap like a spider to its web. Maybe she just desperately wanted to feel wanted for a brief moment by someone, anyone. Whatever the reason Evie had definitely felt as though her efforts were working, and when she reached up and placed her hands on either side of his face so that she could feel his earrings under her palms Jay didn’t even flinch, just leaned down as if ready to accept her kiss of thanks without any protest. Her eyes were closed and the backs of his earrings practically half off when she felt the breath leave her lungs as a steel-toed boot kicked in the back of both her knees and she crumpled to the concrete with a cry of pain.  
“Did you get her bracelets and rings?”  
“Yeah, necklace too, but-”  
“Then let’s fucking go-”  
“Wait Mal, she’s really good.” 

And that was how it started, with two dangerous strangers helping her limp back to their hideout. A sculpted con-artist on her right and the girl she’d only ever heard stories of on her left. Since then Evie had been working alongside them for a few months, helping them to steal things in exchange for protection and of course her own cut of the goods. Plus, they trained her in a lot of street smarts and skills. Not that Evie was an idiot and knew nothing, but she had undoubtedly seen a lot less of the Isle than Mal and Jay had, do to her controlling mother. Suffice to say, the lessons were appreciated. What had started as pure business, however, started to feel more like something from the few books her mother let her keep during childhood, all about princesses and princes set in fairytale worlds that mirrored the Auradon she dreamed of. It started to feel like maybe these people were her friends. Or, at least Jay was. Evie was pretty sure she was, at the very least, slowly but surely growing on Mal, but they certainly were little more than civil with one another, and probably never would be much more. Where Evie was enamored by the foreign concept, Mal didn’t seem very interested in the idea of friends. 

It wasn’t necessarily that Evie thought Mal didn’t like her but she was definitely skeptical of her, and maybe even a little intimidated. Which was fair, it had just been Jay and Mal or Mal and Jay for the longest of times, after all. Since the beginning of time, really. Jay told Evie he and Mal had met when they were seven and had been by each other's side ever since, bound for nearly eight years. Mal had found Jay after his dad kicked him out onto the streets for the night, dissatisfied with his son’s work ethic from the day. This was the first time but certainly not the last, Evie had gathered. Mal saw him sitting on the curb, unmoving even when it started to rain. Not just rain but downpour rather, the water coming down in sheets as it so often did on the gloomy island. Jay said that, even when he asks her today why she did it, Mal is unable to give him an answer. Something about the scene must’ve captured the young girl’s heart who already was being conditioned not to feel and tugged on it though because next thing Jay knew this small, sprightly girl in dark purple was grabbing him by the collar of his shirt and leading him towards the hideout she’d newly won herself. It was a dumb choice at the time, leading some random stranger to her only safe place, but looking back now it was the best decision Mal had ever made. From then on it was just them. Until of course it wasn’t, because here Evie was. 

The sour scaly girl who sat alone across the room, just how she liked, tried to act as if it were bothering her that Jay and Evie had broken the peace. Both leather-clad teens saw the way the corners of Mal’s lips twitched uncharacteristically though, and it gave away the fact that she too found slight humor in the scenario. Evie waited while Jay stared at her expectantly until it appeared to her like Mal’s attention was sufficiently consumed by her newest work in progress yet again before responding. Quietly, the girl with a face still slightly flushed from embarrassment responded to the much larger boy in an equally soft whisper of her own.  
“Some kind of landscape I think, like a sunset or a beach or something cheesy and dreamy like that. Oh, a castle on a beach at sunset! Why? She doesn’t let you look at her work either?”  
Jay scratched the back of his neck with a curious smile, studying Mal as she drew as if trying to picture her drawing his own rendition of the scenes Evie had described. He had to admit, he couldn’t see it.  
“Nope, never. Why a castle?”  
Evie rolled her eyes as if it were obvious, smoothing out the creases in her dress from sitting on the floor.  
“Because why else wouldn’t she let anyone see it? It’s gotta be something embarrassing.”  
At this, Jay laughed yet again but kept it low and under his breath- like the rumble of thunder. 

Jay was very easily amused Evie had found from many hours of joking with him during their various morning and evening runs throughout the week. When Mal was fussing over Jay having not grabbed a man’s silver rings in addition to his gold wristwatch while distracted by Evie, she would do something simple like imitating Mal as she spoke or pretending to breathe fire like a dragon, and Jay would smile. Evie had never thought of herself before as funny really, so it was very validating and perhaps made her happier than it should’ve. He was probably just trying to be nice she told herself, because Mal was certainly less concerned with being nice and she never laughed at Evie, but even if that were the case it didn’t really bother Evie much. Any laugh was better than no laugh, even if it were fake. Her mother was a very good teacher. She’d taught Evie lots of things, instilled in her many skills. Evie could tie and tighten her own corset just right without assistance. She could ballroom dance expertly even though she was a natural klutz and she knew how to cook a four-course meal or sew up any tear imaginable. She had never, however, been taught how to be funny. It wasn’t an important trait for a prince’s girlfriend to possess, I suppose. In fact, she’d been taught not to talk very much period, so I guess there just wasn’t much room in the few words she was allotted for joke making. Still, it felt good whenever Jay’s stern brow would soften and he chuckled at her. Evie made it her personal goal to eventually make Mal do the same, at least once during their time working together. 

Jay kind of felt like the big brother Evie had always wanted. Well no, that’s not true, she had never wanted a big brother persay, when she was little she had always longed for a sister. After all, Jay didn’t seem like the type who would’ve played princess or tea time with her when she was five as a sister of some variety surely would have. But had he been her brother Jay certainly, at the very least, would have kept her company, which was something Evie had and would forever be in need of. Even with all her loneliness though Evie thought it probably a very good thing her mother had never decided to reproduce again, especially not if it had reared a son like Jay…looking back on her own upbringing that just didn’t seem like a very fair fate to wish upon anyone, let alone her friend. If that’s what they were, anyway. It was very difficult for Evie to tell, probably because she’d never before had anything that even hardly resembled a friend, save for maybe Dizzy of course who Evie wasn’t allowed to see but who had been her only companion during childhood. Evie used to make pretend that Dizzy was her long lost little sister, giving one another constant makeovers until one night when she was eleven she’d made the mistake of letting the seven-year-old girl give her hair highlights. Evie remembered being kept up all night in tears as her mother used tweezers and plucked out each individually dyed hair, vowing to make Dizzy pay and keep Evie locked up in her room forever away from the world. She never found out exactly what her mother said or did to Dizzy the following morning when she left the castle early and returned home with a satisfied smile, but even now four years later Dizzy didn’t look at Evie when they walked past one another on the street, and her promise about keeping Evie under lock and key remained unbroken.

Whatever the reason, Evie couldn’t distinguish what she and these new people in her life were meant to be. Sometimes, like right now, it felt like they were just enjoying one another’s company as friends would. I mean they had work to do, they hadn’t sorted through and distributed that day’s haul yet, which usually took only a few minutes and then Evie was on her way home. Yet, today, Jay and Mal had instead decided to let Evie just sit around with them and enjoy the comfort of their hideout, apparently. Maybe it was because it had started raining terribly outside judging from the steady pounding on the metal ceiling and pitter-patter on nearby windows, and the two pseudo criminals felt bad making her walk home in the storm. Even if this was the case, Evie was just happy to be here. Even though she knew it was an ugly trait to possess Evie couldn’t help but always crave the feeling of being wanted, seemingly an impossible feeling for her to obtain. Right now though, even if she wasn’t being asked to stay persay, she didn’t feel like they were waiting for her to leave either, not even Mal, and that meant a lot. 

Plus, she loved their hideout. She never got to spend very much time in it, since normally Mal got weird about other people entering her space Jay said, but it was truly everything Evie’s castle wasn’t. It was a little cramped, messy for her standards, but Evie loved that about it. Her castle was so big and spacious, the marbled walls made you feel like the smallest insignificant thing in the world. She had lots of material items in her bedroom, a vanity with makeup and perfumes and creams to hide her face, a bedside table with facial masks for bedtime and hairbrushes, things to keep her busy, and a huge closet with tiny dresses and gowns and things to help make her look attractive and flatter her painstakingly tiny figure. Even so, the place still managed to feel so empty. With the high ceilings and stone walls and deadbolted door and lack of sunlight from over the treetops- her room always seemed to feel isolated and cold and desolate of life. That was the best thing of all about the messy little hideout that would’ve horrified her mother, it just all felt so lived-in. 

“OR, she’s just embarrassingly bad.”  
Jay’s voice brought Evie back to reality once again, as it was starting to have quite the pattern of doing. Luckily this time she didn’t jump quite as far. Evie laughed at Jay’s theory even though they both knew it to be untrue, you could just tell by looking at Mal that she was good. She didn’t do things unless she was good at them. And, even though it was kind of embarrassing to notice, Evie thought Mal had the hands of an artist. All gentle brushstrokes and careful, jerky movements. Evie longed to see the same quality in her own hands, but instead, she found them shaky and unsteady, and lots of things Mal’s simply weren’t. Evie was no artist. She’d have much rather been the art truthfully, but it was unfortunate she happened so see herself as neither. Evie opened her mouth to respond when Mal cut her off, this time not bothering to look up from her drawing as she hissed between her teeth.  
“I can still hear you, ya know.”  
Jay shook his head, grabbing a balled-up sock from beside him and chucking it at the aggravated girl across from them. He had plenty of ammunition around him on the floor really, Evie hadn’t been lying when she said the place was a mess.  
“Well quit listening then!”  
Expertly Mal dodged the sock before it could hit her in the face, still without looking up, by simply leaning right with a huff. When Mal said nothing more Jay continued speaking, this time dropping the whispering act all together and speaking at a volume that Mal could clearly hear. She was now an unofficial part of the conversation, Evie supposed.  
“I for one, think she’s drawing a person. Look at the way she’s squinting and biting her tongue, tilting her head. She looks too focused to be drawing something abstract like a landscape.”  
Evie could have sworn Mal’s face flushed a little at Jay’s words, some loose strands of her purple hair escaping from behind her ear to cover the new redness. Jay must have noticed this too because he smiled triumphantly and gave Evie a nudge with his elbow. 

“Well? Am I right??”  
Mal didn’t say anything, but she did sigh and set her drawing down, her legs unfurling finally so that her feet pressed against the carpeted floor in front of the couch. Evie watched silently as Mal looked her drawing over once more before tucking it carefully behind one of the plaid couch cushions, careful not to crease it. She hadn’t even realized how special she was supposed to feel over Mal having let her see the special spot she kept all her art pieces hidden from view.  
“Let’s sort through today’s haul, it’s getting late and she needs to get home.”  
Evie deflated at Mal’s cold words as she gestured towards her half-heartedly, somewhat because the abrasive girl couldn’t even be bothered to use her name but mostly because she had to go home. Home. Her mother was going to be mad she stayed out later than usual. She didn’t have a curfew persay, but it was an unspoken rule pretty much that Evie was meant to be home before sundown. A quick glance out the window above her head quickly proved to her she’d completely and utterly broken that rule. 

“Get your shit out.”  
Mal waved a hand dismissively at both Evie and Jay who were still sitting comfortably propped up against the wall, the latter groaning as he finally stood and held out a hand to help Evie up from the floor. The scene mirrored that of the first time they’d met and she graciously accepted his hand with a smile, brushing the wrinkles out of and fluffing the bottom of her dress before moving to get her things. Hidden in the many pockets of her leather jacket, a lot lighter and less scuffed than the other two teens she noticed, were three silver rings, twelve dollars in cash and coins, a golden watch, and a gorgeous blue necklace. The necklace, in particular, she held onto for a moment too long, just admiring it before begrudgingly tossing it with the rest of her things on the rug. Mal and Jay dumped their own items in the center of the living space’s floor as well, each haul consisting of items similar to hers though slightly more ambitious and impressive, like entire handbags, antiques, and other various items from vendors. 

Evie watched silently as Mal divvied out the goods, Jay only butting in intermittently to challenge one of her decisions. It was clear that even though they were ‘partners’, Mal was the one in charge. Evie supposed it was because Jay felt like he owed her something, seeing as it was Mal who had taken him in essentially. It was a respect thing. With few interruptions, it only took a few minutes for Mal to have sorted everything into three piles, one for her and Jay to keep, one smaller pile for Jay to bring home to Jafar, and the last for Evie and her mother. The piles were more or less equal in value, which Evie couldn’t help but think was kind of generous of the purple-haired faery, seeing as she could have very easily kept the best pieces for herself. Instead, she only favored her own pile slightly, letting Jay and Evie keep the items that pertained to them and their respective parents regardless of worth for the most part. Evie took in her pile, and immediately couldn’t help but smile seeing Mal had left the blue necklace from earlier for her. Well for her mom, really, but for some reason, Evie felt like it was meant for her. It’d been her best find of the day by far. It was one of those necklaces that sat on your chest almost like a plate- all intricate metalwork. The silver spirals had small sapphire gems peppering the edges of the necklace, and in the center of it, there was the most gorgeous gem Evie had ever seen. It was all fake no doubt, nothing on the Isle was real, but for Evie, it didn’t really matter. It looked beautiful and that was enough. She resonated with that sentiment. 

Clutching the necklace in her hands she looked up at Mal thankfully, who to her surprise was already watching the girl as if waiting for a reaction. As soon as their eyes met Mal looked away and back down at the money she must’ve been counting in her hands, or was pretending to count anyway.  
“Are you sure you don’t want this, M? My mom will be happy with just one of these bracelets or something, I can only imagine how much this would sell for in town.”  
Evie hadn’t realized she’d made a nickname for Mal until Jay started laughing in the snarky way he always did, raising his eyebrows at her.  
“M, huh? Almost makes her sound cu- OW!”  
Jay was cut off as Mal chucked a leather wallet from the pile at his head, smacking it off his temple with a satisfied chuckle. Evie laughed too, though not loud enough to drown out Mal’s giggle. She wanted to hear it.  
“One, I don’t do nicknames, and two, I saw the way you were looking at it. There’s plenty of other stuff here and...just take the damn necklace before I change my mind.”  
Even though Mal was looking at her lap with a small reserved smile as Jay rubbed his forehead and grumbled under his breath, she was speaking to Evie, and that was close enough to Mal smiling at her. Mal was practically smiling at her. Evie beamed.  
“Okay, M.” 

———————————————————-

Evie had the stupidest smile on her face, even as she stepped out of the comfortable slice of safety they called their hideout and out into the raging storm and dark night that had enveloped the Isle in the last few hours. She faltered only briefly before bravely continuing outside, feeling Mal and Jay’s eyes on her back. She was hesitant because it was dark out, and truthfully she’d never before had to walk home alone in the dark. Plus, Mommy would kill her if she let the rain soil her face and make her makeup run. She had few choices though and merely took a deep breath to brace herself before stepping out of the doorway and out onto the metal flights of stairs that were echoing with rain. She squealed as cold rain pelted her back, closing both her eyes as she nearly ran down the flights of fire escape stairs blindly. She hadn’t realized Jay or Mal were following her out the door, their footsteps masked by the rumble of thunder overhead and the cacophony of white noise the raindrops created. She might have run all the way home with her eyes closed and her head down to shield it from the rainwater had someone not grabbed her arm just as she was rounding the third and final flight of stairs.  
“Hey, watch your step.” 

Mal’s voice came just in time, scaring Evie but saving her from stepping into a dent in the step underneath her she realized as her eyes shot open. She made a mental note that the last flight of stairs got pretty warped and probably hard to sprint down in heels, as she shot Mal an embarrassed yet appreciative smile in the dark. Mal gave her a small, tight smile back at her from the corner of her eye before quickly refocusing on the stairs again and continuing on. Evie too continued her descent, at a slightly slower pace this time as she realized she was already thoroughly soaked, and at least a few miles from home, there was no hope of her getting back unsoiled. This, combined with the knowledge of it being past her make-believe curfew, made Evie’s stomach knot. Maybe Mommy will already be asleep when I get home, she told herself, though she knew it was a lie. All she could do now was pray her mother was feeling especially kind and might appreciate the day’s jewelry finds more than she usually did. It wasn’t that she was afraid of her mother hurting her, at least not in the same way she knew many other parents on the Isle shamelessly hurt their children, but her mother had other more...careful and meticulous ways of punishing her. 

“You guys can head back inside, it’s pretty nasty out here.”  
Jay swung his arm over Evie’s shoulders as she met him and an unamused looking Mal at the bottom of the stairs. Secretly she of course didn’t want them to head back inside, she was kind of embarrassingly terrified of the dark and not very confident in her ability to protect herself or find her own way back home in the storm, but she also didn’t want to inconvenience anybody. Evie wasn’t meant to be a nuisance or a liability, she was supposed to be an asset to them. The last thing she wanted was for them to reconsider the friendship she was so certain they were just on the outskirts of forming.  
“You’re right, it is nasty out here...maybe you should just I dunno, stay the night.”  
Evie’s heart hammered in her chest, but she hardly even had the chance to consider the offer before Mal was speaking, almost screaming. Maybe it was just so that her voice could be heard over the loud crash of rain and sudden claps of thunder in the distance, but she whirled around and stared at Jay incredulously and instinctually. Evie shrunk away and into him. 

“NO!? No, Jay, what?? She can’t just stay the night, what the hell?”  
“Well, why not?”  
“Because she’s- we-”  
“Mal you’re being an ass, she didn’t even get to answer!”  
“Because I get to answer for her! You didn’t talk to me about this first, and technically it’s MY hideout, so-”  
“Oh, now it’s YOUR hideout?”  
The increasingly angry voices around her melted and faded into the sound of the rain and the pounding of her heart, and before Evie could stop herself she was pushing away from Jay and running from them, from the fight she hadn’t meant to cause. She thought she could make out someone calling her name after her, but she was already booking it around the corner and down one of the backroads she was pretty sure would take her to the forest before she could make out who’s it was. Honestly, he didn’t even know why she was crying all of a sudden, really unless that was just rain running down her face and making her eyes sting. Her hair and dress were both drenched, and her leather jacket felt so heavy on her body she was almost tempted to just take it off and ditch it near a sewer drain for someone more in need of it than her.

Strands of her wet hair, hardly curly anymore and nearly black from the water, stuck to the sides of her face and coat as she ran through the sheets of rain, thankful the storm was drowning out the heavy clomp of her heels on the pavement. Evie was thankful at times like this that her mother had made her walk almost exclusively in heels since she was old enough to stop crawling practically because it made running in the shoes that might have otherwise given most people trouble an easy task. Her feet were so calloused and the tendons in her calf had actually shortened and reshaped from wearing impractical shoes so commonly, that it almost hurt her more to wear something else or no shoes at all. Evie didn’t quite realize this was something to be concerned about rather than proud of, but I suppose like many things that too was her mother’s doing. 

Evie couldn’t quite breathe, partially because she was literally sprinting down dark alleyway after alleyway, but mostly because she was kind of having a panic attack. She hated that she got like this. One minute she was fine, she could be sitting pretty with perfect posture and a smile, all polite laughs and comments about the weather, fluttery eyes and parted lips, and the next she felt like the entire weight of the world was pressed against her chest and a fist was clenched around her heart. When she was little it would happen often for no reason at all, and she used to think she was dying. She would stop her game of house to gasp for air and claw at her chest and cry. Then her mother caught on and now she was awfully good at dying subtly. Mommy had spent years helping her master a smile that could stay even if she were having a panic attack and was on the brink of passing out. Save for a few sputtering breaths and a slightly furrowed brow, Evie could mask whenever the familiar constricting feeling settled in her lungs almost entirely. Now though, as murky puddles splashed up her legs and her eyes darted around wildly to see in the dark shadows permeating every corner of the Isle, she didn’t bother to try concealing her emotions as she’d been diligently taught to. Evie let herself unravel as she ran, like a layer of her peeled away every time her foot hit the pavement and propelled her closer to the home she so desperately didn’t want to return to. 

It was crazy how quickly the night had taken a turn. It had been such a good day. Her mother had been asleep when she left to go out that morning, she hadn’t even had to hear any backhanded compliments about her looks or saccharin critics on her makeup and outfit choices. She had even eaten breakfast because Mal and Jay were kind enough to offer her some of theirs, and normally she’d have denied such a sweet offer but she was so hungry and in a good enough mood that she indulged herself and ate nearly two bowls of oatmeal. Cinnamon, her favorite. It was a little watery and cold but they never usually got oatmeal in the food ration shipments from Auradon. Today had been lucky. And then the three of them had gone about their usual routine, hitting all the usual vendors and only vaguely sketchy parts of town where they could swipe things, working until near sundown even though now it almost felt less like work and more like fun. And then best of all Evie got to hang out with Jay and Mal at their place, the little sweet spot between fire escapes that she’d only ever been inside on a number of occasions. She was starting to feel like maybe she belonged here, like maybe there was more to this new life that she enjoyed other than the adrenaline rush, like perhaps her mother was wrong and she could be something more. She could be Princess Evelyn of the Isle, but she could also be an accomplice, a hard worker, and most of all perhaps a friend. 

But every time she started to feel the littlest bit ahead like maybe her life could really be changing for the better and she might not always feel the way she did when she was locked up in her tower nursing a stomach-ache and resisting the urge to sob at night when she felt most alone, it was like life had to reel the girl back in and prove her wrong. It would smack her on the wrist the same way mother did, and chastise her for having her head in the clouds, for dreaming of grandeur when she was meant for a life of domestics. And sometimes it was all just a little too much, and sometimes Evie just wanted to let herself come undone and not care who saw, as she did right now. Her frantic pace slowed as the ache in her chest and head for oxygen won over the staticy feeling coursing through her legs, and she turned left into a small, desolate alley. The run here had been such a blur she hardly knew where she was, definitely turned around and a little lost. As she doubled over and leaned hunched against one of the dumpsters in the alley she cursed under her breath at herself, trying to slow her heart rate. She was so stupid and naive. She wasn’t made for this life, she wasn’t meant for the streets. What was she doing here? She shouldn’t have been here. 

As if on cue, like the universe had yet another cruel trick to play, the rain pouring over her shaking body had lightened up just enough for her to hear footsteps rounding the corner. She shot up in time to meet the eyes of a boy she didn’t recognize, probably because it was dark and she wasn’t exactly familiar with most residents of the Isle, turn the corner. Even so, she could tell he wasn’t anyone she wanted to be stuck in a dead-end alleyway with as she was now, alone and vulnerable.  
“Hey cutie, you lost?”  
Chills ran down Evie’s spine at the way he spoke to her as if she were a poor abandoned kitten, which she very well may have looked like due to how hard she was shaking from the cold. Straightening up completely and pushing away from the wall Evie clenched her fists and tried to regain enough breath so that she could properly speak. She took in the boy’s rugged appearance quickly as he slowly inched his way nearer to her. It was dark out, but she could tell he was big that’s for sure. He was backlit by the moon, which was foggy with storm clouds and dim but her only real source of light, and against it, his outline looked enormous. Evie couldn’t tell if that was because he truly was at least larger than Jay, or because she felt so small, but she hoped she wouldn’t be sticking around long enough to find out. Even though his voice sounded nice if not slightly slurred from alcohol, but his devious smile gave him away, and just as quickly as it had left Evie felt the panic in her chest settled beneath ribs rear its ugly head yet again. 

“I’m not, thanks.”  
Evie was quick but this boy, equally drenched by rainwater, was quicker, and as she moved fast to sidestep him and run past all this and back out into the streets, he snagged her just in time. One of his large fists clamped down on her wet hair, and Evie screamed as her momentum was suddenly halted as he yanked on her hair hard enough to knock her over onto her butt.  
“Leaving so soon?”  
A crash of thunder so loud it sounded like the barrier was cracking open tore through Evie as she looked up at the boy tightly gripping her hair and wrapping it around his fingers. He was hunched over her close enough that she could clearly see his face now, and he looked to be only a few years older than her, maybe 18 or 19. He looked Asian, perhaps, and had a thin scar that passed through his left eyebrow. She definitely didn’t recognize him enough to know his name or parents, though his attire suggested he might have been one of Uma’s goons down by the wharves, some kind of mock-up pirate. He wasn’t Gil or Harry though, but maybe she vaguely remembered him hanging around those two by the docks?

Evie flinched as lightning flashed across the sky accompanied by yet another clap of thunder, craning her neck to look up at the boy holding her still. If she wasn’t cold from the soaked clothes she was wearing before she certainly was now, she was literally sitting in a puddle. She debated trying to swing at him, curse him out and tell him off till he let her go, but she decided against it, taking the opposite approach.  
“Please, just let me go. What do you want?”  
Even though she was feeling very indignant and frustrated, Evie decided to play it smart and mustered up the energy to tap into the part of her that knew how to manipulate people and get what she wanted. She was dumbing herself down as she so often did, trying to sound as helpless as possible. It didn’t help that truthfully Evie was feeling pretty helpless right around now. The boy’s smile widened.  
“I want my necklace back, bitch.”  
For a moment Evie’s face flashed one of bemusement as the boy yanked on her hair yet again, scraping her across the concrete, until she realized she did recognize him, at least a little bit. She’d run into him today in fact down by the water, running some shitty little market booth with jewelry. That was where she’d swiped the pretty blue necklace, the blue necklace that Mal had let her keep for herself. It was her’s.  
“No.”  
“...Excuse me?”

The word had left Evie’s mouth before she fully registered what she was saying, but she stood by her decision all the same. She couldn’t give that necklace away. Mal had given it to her, and Evie didn’t have many things that were hers. She had lots of things, sure. Lots of dresses, lots of shades of lipstick, lots of things her mother shouldn’t have prioritized over other necessities like food and water yet always did, but even so those things weren’t hers. None of those commodities belonged to her, they were Mommy’s. Because she was Mommy’s. Her mother treated Evie like a new handbag. She was all for looks, all cosmetic. And so the things she possessed at home weren’t her own, they were just an extension of her mother’s dreams and desires. But this necklace was Evie’s. It was something she could keep, something that could keep her company because when she had swiped it from the vendor earlier that day and admired breathlessly how the sapphire blue gemstones danced in the sunlight, it had reminded her of Mal. Which might have seemed odd, because Mal was all twisty purples and earthy greens- but maybe it was just the cold chill of the metal against her tan skin that reminded her of the sour teen and her sordid attitude. Whatever the reason, Evie wasn’t giving up her necklace. Not to her mother, and certainly not to this idiot who’d been too distracted to properly protect it from thieves in the first part. 

“N-no.”  
Evie felt like she was drowning in this rain, her lungs and ears and eyes and mouth and stomach full of dirty water unfit to drink. Lightning flashed across the sky yet again, illuminating how angry the boy in front of her looked as he twisted her hair and forced her to turn and face him, still kneeling. Evie hurried to try and appeal to him, so torn between wanting to stand her ground and wanting to just please this man so he’d leave her be, let her go home already and get warm. She’d never thought of her castle hidden deep in the woods as a very warm place, but right now anything would’ve been better than where she was currently. She briefly wondered what time it was, guessing some time after nine maybe. Her mother was going to lose her mind.  
“I’m sorry but- look, I have a lot of other really nice jewelry, I’ll give you all of that, okay? Everything I have I promise.”  
The boy scoffed.  
“You say it like you have a choice.” 

Before Evie could react the boy looming over her leaned in hard and tackled her, effortlessly knocking the air out of her lungs. She’d been trying to hold her breath as her mother had taught her, but now her breathing came sporadically and her lungs rattled. Evie wasn’t a particularly bad fighter, surprisingly. A lot of people underestimated her because she looked tiny and frail, which in a lot of ways she was, but Jay had worked with her on the days Mal didn’t feel like stealing and trained her in combat as best he could. Evie took to it all pretty quick, funnily enough, kind of a natural in the field even though it couldn’t have been further from her mother’s ideals. Mal wouldn’t have let the girl run with them if she was a liability, so she proved she could hold her own. That being said, this boy was big and strong. He was at least twice her size and laying on her now with rain from above pelting them both and making it hard to see, it felt like he was genuinely crushing her. She tried squirming out from under him, clawing at his face and back and any skin she could get her hands on, but he was persistent and pressed his body against her until she was panicking, one of his elbows on her neck constricting her windpipe. With one hand, the one that wasn’t currently tangled in her hair, he grasped both of her thin wrists in his grip and held them still, pinning them to the concrete. Evie was screaming but you couldn’t hear her, not over the storm echoing down desolate streets. To be fair even if someone had heard her, she doubted anyone would have come to her aid. After all, the sounds of panicked screams from down a darkened alleyway weren’t all that uncommon on the Isle, unfortunately. 

Evie tried to get her legs out from underneath him to kick him or knee him, but he had her pinned good, so instead, she inhaled as best she could through the body wracking sobs that had suddenly re-erupted and spit in the boy’s face. The boy shouted as her saliva landed right in his eye, covering the characteristic scar and also some as his cheek as he grunted aggravatedly. Immediately he let go of both her hair and hands to wipe his face, a crazy enraged look consuming his features. She took the opportunity to slip out from him enough to punch him in the face hard, not missing a beat as her fist collided with his cheekbone and split it open. What she hadn’t been expecting was for him to meet her back with a punch of his own almost immediately after, the fist that was twice the size of her's slamming into her lower jaw and mouth so hard she worried briefly he’d knocked out one of her teeth. Her head hit the concrete under her hard but she wasn’t given much time to ruminate on this thought, as he punched her yet again. And again. And again. Suddenly Evie was no longer fighting this boy, he was simply beating her up, battering her face repeatedly. 

Her perfectly sculpted nose cracked unnaturally, her raised cheekbones felt like they’d been cut open and separated from her skull, and if she could see before she certainly couldn’t see now. Blood from somewhere above her eyebrow dripped down into her left eye and leaked from out of her mouth as she spat and sputtered between hits to try and breathe. She raised her forearms to try and protect her face from him but it was no use, and Evie was practically wailing as she felt her lip collide and go through her bottom teeth, or felt her eyes swell up and surely blacken. The saddest part was that she wasn’t even crying because it hurt, she was crying because she could only imagine how ugly she must’ve looked. Evie had never been hurt before, not terribly at least. Her mother didn’t hit her, because of course she wouldn’t her appearance was all that mattered, and Evie had always been a cautious child because of this. She didn’t know the pains of a broken bone, or a scraped elbow, or a busted lip. Now she understood that in the moments they happen none of these things actually hurt much at all, they burned. She felt like her entire body was engulfed in flames, and her lungs were suffering from smoke inhalation. It didn’t help that everything about Evie’s body was unequipped for withstanding rough treatment. Her skin was like paper, her bones like glass. They pressed flesh to her skin in the way a princess’ were meant to, her skin taught. Her ribs were like lace and kissed her velveteen stomach just right when she breathed, and her angular collarbones accentuated necklaces perfectly. Her mother had made sure everything about her body was fit to be looked at. She was like an expensive piece of art in a museum, almost, you could look but never touch. 

“Hand over whatever you’ve got on you. Jewelry, cash, whatever’s worth a damn.”  
Evie hesitated only because she couldn’t quite hear the boy, who at some point in the last minute must’ve gotten up from on top of her, over the ringing in her ears. She couldn’t even tell if it was raining anymore, she couldn’t feel anything. Her fingertips were cold and numb at her sides, and she tried moving them to do as he said when the boy impatiently gave three swift kicks into her side. Another scream was elicited from the girl but the kicks gave her new life, clutching her side with both her hands and curling up in a ball. She could have sworn she heard her ribs crack. She curled her fingers pathetically around the delicate bones there, still ringing from the kick. Again, the boy kicked the girl who couldn’t open her eyes half from swelling and half from exhaustion, though this time in her back because she’d turned away from him. Her spine curled in on itself as again she cried out, not having enough hands to hold in place all the pieces of herself she felt were falling off. With shaky hands Evie didn’t hesitate this time in fear of receiving another kick, unzipping her leather jacket and slipping it off. She tossed the jacket in the general direction of the boy’s feet wordlessly as she sobbed. Everything from that day’s run, save for the blue necklace tucked away safely in her bra still, were hidden in the pockets of that coat. He could have them all, she didn’t care. 

The boy loitered around for a few more minutes, presumably checking the various pockets of her coat for the promised jewelry, before leaving. He didn’t even mention the absence of the necklace. Evie strained her ears to listen for his footsteps, echoing off down the alleyway and around the corner. She couldn’t help but notice they matched the cadence of her pounding heart. She didn’t want to move, she didn’t feel like she could. While her face had received the worst of it by far, blood still streaming out of her mouth and nose and mixing with the puddle water accumulating around her body, the rest of her wasn’t in great shape either. Her tights were ripped and the backs of her legs and calves were scraped from struggling against the rough concrete. Her palms and elbows were scraped up as well, and pain shot through her sides every time she tried to inhale or exhale shallow breaths. Surely her back was bruised, as would be her stomach. There wasn’t enough makeup in the world to cover every inch of her sore body. She clung to these parts of her body that ached and screamed as if when she let go her bones would physically shatter and crumble within her. Her head was pounding so badly she probably would’ve vomited if she weren’t too depleted of energy to do so. Her hair was clumped and matted with blood in some places, and there wasn’t a doubt in her mind her dress was probably stained and ruined. She sniffled at this thought, which was a dumb thought to cry over when you’re fighting to stay conscious beside a dumpster, but this outfit was one of Evie’s favorites, and that was simply how Evie’s conditioned mind worked. 

Thunder clapped loudly in the distance just to remind Evie it was still raining and storming out apparently, and that she was still alive and that outside the confines of her mind the rest of the bleak world still existed. She needed to get up, she needed to move. If she stayed here there wasn’t a doubt in her mind that someone else might find her, and her fate could become even worse very quickly. She hissed through her teeth as she tried to push up on one of her elbows, the other clutching her stomach. It took her a few minutes but eventually, she was sitting up, trying to will her mind not to lay back down. Evie strained her eyes to open, eventually being able to see through her left eye and only a small sliver of the right which she guessed must have been more swollen. She touched her face tentatively, pulling her fingertips away to see they were coated with think blood. In the darkness, the otherwise crimson fluid looked black like ink or tar, and it made her stomach twist. She glanced down at her dress, also covered in dirt and blood particularly around her collar where it’d dripped down from her face. 

Carefully Evie dipped her hand in a nearby puddle, cupping the chilling rainwater. She shivered at just how cold the dirty gutter water was, glad almost that she was nearly too numb to feel it. Painstakingly Evie dipped her fingers into the puddle several times and then wiped her face, going back and forth in an attempt to try and clear away as much of the blood with rainwater as she could. When she ran her hand over her nose and lips she couldn’t help but cry a little harder, because the burning feeling was starting to subside enough that she could feel the stinging pain of split open and bruised skin. She wondered if her nose was broken, how crooked it might be when it once sat so perfectly straight. She wondered if any of this would scar, if she would be left with ugly marks to taint her features forever so that this night wouldn’t so easily be forgotten. Mommy would find a way to fix it if this were true, she always did, but if she looked even half as bad as she felt, Evie wasn’t sure it was worth return home at all. 

Evie didn’t entirely remember getting home, actually. She remembered yelling in excruciating pain as she mustered up enough energy to push herself up and off of the ground, grasping at the dumpster for support as it felt like her knees would buckle under her. Evie was used to this sensation though and expertly locked her knees as she sometimes had to when her legs decided not to carry her anymore. She stumbled back out into the nearly deserted streets, save for a few young homeless kids taking shelter inside boxes drooping with rainwater or under stairwells, but they paid her little attention even in what she thought to be her grotesque state. On the Isle, villain kids didn’t even blink at monsters. She briefly considered turning back towards the hideout and staying the night there, but decided against it. She didn’t want to see Jay or Mal. She didn’t want to see the pity in their eyes, the questioning looks of concern they might give her. She wanted to just face her mother and get it over with, let that shrill voice cut right through her as it tore her apart like it had every day for 15 years, let those eyes nearly black or red with anger that scarily mirrored her own bore into her and make her pay attention. That’s what she deserved, looking down at herself now she knew it was what she deserved. 

She did this, she’d ruined everything and it was all her fault. She’d done like she always did and got her hopes up, she’d convinced herself of the impossible. She truly believed she could have friends, that she could live a life outside the one she was destined to have, that she could be more. But she wasn’t. She was oh so less. She wanted to have both, and now she would have neither. If mother locked her up forever after this, chained her to the walls and left her there to rot, maybe it wouldn’t have been such a bad thing. 

As Evie pushed open the heavy double doors to her castle she straightened her posture and sucked in her stomach out of habit, as if that would somehow help improve her appearance when her face was so black and blue it matched her hair. The place looked dark and empty as it so often did, but she could tell from the still-lit candles lining the spiral staircase in the center of the grand hall that Mommy was still up. She could tell by the smell of her perfume that permeated the air too that she couldn’t have been very far.  
Evie shakily reached into the top of her dress and pulled out her necklace, still blue and silver, and pristine somehow when everything else from that day had been ruined. She ran her fingers over it, trying to memorize the pattern. It wasn’t her necklace. It had never been her necklace. 

“M-mommy?”  
Evie tried to manage a smile as she felt her mother’s shadow cast over her, the tall bony woman emerging from the parlor room. Evie didn’t look up at her, afraid of what she would see even though she knew what she would see. She did try and smile down at her shoes though, her cracked lips protesting in pain as she did so. With shaky hands, she held out the necklace.  
“Here Mommy, I got you a necklace.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading! This oneshot was originally the first chapter to a fic I started literally a year ago and haven’t touched since, and so I figured maybe it was time someone read it! That’s why the ending is sad, it wasn’t originally intended to be an ending! I hope you guys enjoyed it regardless tho, finally some Descendants content! As always poor Evie. );


End file.
